Types of Live Performances

Live musical performers (vocalists/instrumentalists with or without "backing tracks")

Theatrical performance (plays, dramatic productions)

Dance

DJ/Scratch

Stand-Up Comedy

Improvisational Graphics

Frequently Asked Questions

What Is A Live Performance In Second Life?

A live performance in Second Life is presented by a person who is represented in-world by an avatar, and is creating the performance in real-time, streaming the audio (or audio and video) portions into Second Life as they are being created.

Playing back a previously recorded performance, whether audio, video or Second Life machinima, is generally not considered to be a live performance if there are no live elements performed while the audience is watching the show (although even this definition will likely raise some "discussion" from some corners ;).

Playing a show in Second Life is done by sending a live music stream from your own computer to a Shoutcast or Icecast server, and mapping the server's stream URL to a parcel of land in Second Life. People who visit the parcel in Second Life will hear the live music stream. Musicians are also typically logged into Second Life at the same time as they are performing, so they can chat with the audience between songs and even take requests! There are also many Residents in Second Life who run clubs and venues specifically to host and feature live musicians, so you don't necessarily have to own your own parcel of land to get started.

Where can I go check out a concert?

Log into Second Life, click the "Find" button, and under "Events" select the category "Live Music." Click the Search button and you'll immediately see a list of upcoming Live Music events and venues. Click on one you find interesting, and you can teleport right to it. Be sure you have have the "play streaming music" option turned on in the Viewer's Audio Preferences (Viewer 2: Me > Preferences)(Viewer 1.23: Edit > Preferences). When you are on a parcel of land that has streaming music, a small Music Control window will automatically pop up on your screen. Click the play button, and you're listening to music...live!

How do I host a Live Music event?

Land owners in Second Life can stream music to their parcels to be enjoyed by anyone who visits their land. If you own a parcel of land, you can set a "Music URL" specific for your land. This "Music URL" can be MPEG-audio (.mp2, .mp3) and Ogg Vorbis (.ogg) from streaming servers or a basic web server. Anyone visiting your land in Second Life will automatically hear the music you wish to share with them.

I'm a DJ. Can I spin records in Second Life?

Absolutely! It basically works the same way as described above for musicians. There are many popular clubs in Second life full of Residents who socialize and dance the night away, listening to live DJs who can take requests from the audience during their set. Alternatively, you could build your own club on your own land, creating not only the musical experience for your audience but also the entire virtual venue.

Who Is Involved With Second Life Live Performance?

Additional Notes

Please keep in mind that the audio streams come directly to your Second Life viewer, they do not get streamed by Linden Lab's servers. None of this content comes via Linden Lab's servers at all, so performance issues with streams are completely outside of Linden Lab's control. Some streams reach a maximum number of listeners and then accept no more. Some have poor connections and may stutter or stop.

Most internet radio stations will provide a playlist link (.pls or .m3u) file, which will will trigger your local mp3 player to start up and stream music on your computer. In Second Life you cannot use playlist file links, instead you require the specific address of the music stream. This information is contained within the playlist file, therefore if you open the playlist file in notepad or similar, you can see the actual music stream (usually listed as File1= or File2= in the file).

A few important things to remember:

Legal Issues: If you choose to stream your own music into SL directly or using a streaming relay host, the content and any copyright/royalty fees and any other possible issues are your responsibility.

To hear streaming audio, remember that you need to enable the options on the Audio/Video tab of your Preferences (Edit > Preferences) in the Second Life client.

If there is an invalid URL in the "Music URL" field on the land, you won't get an error message in Second Life (you'll simply won't hear anything). Try double checking the stream in an external player such as Winamp, foobar2000 or iTunes to make sure it is the correct URL and actually broadcasting, and that it has not run out of available streams for listeners.

You can only change the Music URL directly on land that you own or on group land when you are an officer.

You can stream MPEG-audio (.mp2, .mp3) and Ogg Vorbis (.ogg) from streaming servers or pre-recorded sessions/tracks from a basic web server.

Streaming directly from a audio file URL (as opposed to a live streaming URL) will play the file once, but not loop it.

Can't get your shoutcast stream to work? If your stream url looks like http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:8000/ remove the trailing slash: http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:8000 Stream URLs typically have a port number like :8000 in the example above. And remember, currently you cannot use playlist files (.pls/.m3u) in Second Life.